TBR HORi 273 



! tiary beds of central and western D 



ica being the original home of the horse. Th< eat 



member of thi tly leading up to the horse was 



ppu8, an older eocene form, aboul as large .■■- 

 which had four well-developed toes and the rudiments <>f :i 

 fifth on each for- four, and threi behind. In later 



ne beds appeared an animal (Orohippus) <>f similar 

 . but with only four toes in front and three behind. In 

 newer beds, i.e., lower miocene, arc found the reman 

 Mesohipp s, which was as large as a sheep and had three 

 and the splint of another in each fore-foot, with but 

 three toes behind. In later miocem • another form 



i I chitherium or Miohippus) had i tne number of 



. but with the "splint bone of the outer or fifth digit 

 reduced to a short remnant." The splint hones, then, rep- 

 it two of the digits 1 animals. The suc- 

 forms were -till more horse-like. "In the Plio- 

 cene above, a thr< | Hipparion or Profoliipj 

 about as large as a donkey, was abundant, and still hig 

 up a near ally of the modern horse, with onlv 

 on each foot (Pliohippus) makes his appearance. A true 

 Equus, as large as the existing horse, appears just above 

 this horizon, and tin jomplcte." (Ma - 

 .-il horses extended <>\er portions of North and South 

 America, but are supposed to have become extincl before 

 the present Indiana appeared, though there are indical 

 that the horse was living on the plains of both North ami 

 th America at the time of the disc ountrv, 

 and that the Indians umi] them. 



The horse i Equus caballus) is the most useful of all do- 

 3tic animals, and next to .-hip- a prime means of the 

 diffusion of civilization. By artificial selection 

 number of varieties, races, and -trains have been produced, 

 adapted for the performance of different kinds of w«>rk. 

 The horse only exists in a domestii 

 states that the horse in the Orient lias live, and in the 

 (Africa) six lumbar vertebrae; in Arabia both forms occur; 



